Defamation case: Court allows Arun Jaitley's plea for DDCA records

New Delhi: Finance Minister Arun Jaitley's plea seeking summoning of records of Delhi and District Cricket Association (DDCA) in a criminal defamation complaint filed by him against Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and five other AAP leaders was allowed by a Delhi court on Monday.

In an application filed before CMM Sanjay Khangwal, Jaitley sought summoning of records of DDCA for the relevant period in which he was the President of the cricketing body. Jaitley was the President of DDCA between December 1999 and December 2013.

The court after hearing brief submissions allowed Jaitley's plea.

Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley. Image courtesy: agencies

The court is currently recording pre-summoning evidence in the criminal defamation complaint filed by Jaitley, who had recorded his statement before the CMM in support of his plea on 5 January.

During recording of his statement, Jaitley had told the court that Kejriwal and five other AAP leaders--Kumar Vishwas, Ashutosh, Sanjay Singh, Raghav Chadha and Deepak Bajpai-- had made "false and defamatory" statements and rejected the charge that he had siphoned out money from DDCA for his own benefit.

He had said he had not received any money from anybody during his tenure as President of DDCA.

He has accused them of making statements damaging his reputation even after the complaint was filed against them and that their statements against him and his family members had lowered his dignity in the eyes of the public at large.

Jaitley had on December 21, 2015 filed criminal defamation complaint against Kejriwal and other AAP leaders for allegedly defaming him and sought their prosecution for offences that entail a punishment of up to two years in jail.

In his complaint, Jaitley had said the Chief Minister and other AAP leaders, with common intention, have from December 15 last undertaken "a false, malicious and defamatory campaign against him and his family members for political mileage causing irreversible damage to him."

The complaint had referred to certain allegations made by AAP leaders in press conferences, including one claiming that the CBI had raided the office of a Delhi government officer looking for Jaitley's "tax scam files" and there was corruption worth several hundred crores during his tenure and that he had shielded DDCA for over 15 years.

Jaitley had said such statements have been made orally and through Twitter handle of the AAP leaders, which were carried by the media from 15 December-20 December last year.